Ladies and gentlemen, take my advice. Pull down your pants, and slide on the ice.

Thursday, January 06, 2011

2010 in Review: Part 2, Getting a job

Before this period of unemployment, the longest I was without a job was 3 weeks. That was in 1988 when I was fired as a car salesman. I had a wife and three young children to feed and I felt my world crashing down around me. In 2010, I took it much more calmly, at least until I started getting the "thanks but no thanks" letters.

As I had mentioned in my previous post, I had gotten quite a bit of support from many friends, including some of my high school classmates. More about that in a future post. The one friend who gave me some support and also much needed advice is a distant relative with a very cool name, Cliff Feightner. Cliff has both IT and management experience. He took a look at my resume and gave me some pointers to either aim it in one direction or another, since one couldn't tell if I was looking for a job in retail or manufacturing.

When the opportunity for InfoCision came up, I sent emails to several friends asking for advice and prayer. One friend, Scott, was very excited for me, as InfoCision is one of the top companies to work for in this area. Cliff did some research on my behalf and gave me pros and cons.

The day of the interview, I was all shined up, wearing a tie for the first time in years. I took a copy of myt resume in with me and also filled out an application. The interview went very well and I was told that I would hear from them within a week. The next morning, I was asked to come back and take a drug test, which I did the following day. I was then given the date when I would start training.

October 11, I woke up very nervous, as it was the first day on a new full time job in over 18 years. It's been somewhat nerve wracking the past 3 months, but I do like this job.

InfoCision is a company which has call centers in Ohio, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia. The corporate office is in Akron Ohio. We call for many clients, non profit and for profit businesses. The company offers quite a bit of benefits. These include a 401k, medical and dental, on site fitness center, and on site doctor. At this time, I hope to advance in the company and stay there until time to retire. From the time I got the first call, I felt that this job would be a good fit for my skills, and management at InfoCision is working with me to ensure I am in a position that best utilizes them.

Band videos courtesy of Matthew Killough

The videos of the Rittman Indians Marching Band were recorded at various band shows by Rittman resident Matthew Killough, who writes his own blog, Wixy Rittman High Band Gone Bananas. He happens to be a very avid fan of the band.